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Part 1: Making The Second Main Series Game on the DS
Masuda says he always wanted to make 2 titles for the DS (Being Gens 4 and 5), especially because the DS is so popular worldwide. There were very aware that having a second title on DS could mean the games would feel the same, and have done their best to avoid that with these games.
He realized ideas like "Go to a Pokemon Centre and trade" were fixed in his mind and did his best to break them down, because he's been working on the games since the start. They took this as an opportunity to re-evaluate rules and systems in the game.

They wanted to make the games more accessible to older players to lower the number of people who were "growing out" of Pokemon. Stuff like adding Kanji to make it easier to read.

The producer of the games, Ishihara, was very happy when Masuda suggest all these radical changes to the games. He says even he had the idea that each generation of Pokemon games had to come out on a different system, but because of the DS's long life and popularity worldwide he was glad for the freedom that creating on the same platform gave them. Ishihara, who Iwata calls a 'veteran' of the series thought "Can it be changed that much? Can we really pull it off" when Masuda told him of the changes that he wanted.

Sugimori thought Masuda's suggestions were a bit crazy. When he was told all the Pokemon would be new he said "Gimme a break! Couldn't we lower the number a bit?" but Masuda refused to budge. Iwata comments that Masuda is stubborn, and Masuda agrees.

Part 2: The Brand New World of Pokemon
Sugimori said he was resistant to Masuda's ideas, but also says that he knew Masuda was not mistaken. There were around 200 pages of planning sheets for new features, explaining exactly what crossing a bridge would mean, or how we'd show the player going into someone else's game world. They didn't do it with DP this way, in fact this is the first time they have. This was to do with all the new challenges they were facing with these games. Once again, they confirm that they used New York as a motif. This was primarily to fulfill the goal of giving these games a new feel, and also so he could have a concert there (like they do in Japan in the region where the games are based off, using music from the relevant games. Apparently), but it might be impossible this time. After deciding this they began deciding where to place towns etc. In doing so they visited the Museum of Modern Art.

While he was sitting in the garden of the Museum, he came up with the idea of using a hexagon. Also, because he’s heard about children not being able to complete the game he decided to try and make the direction you travel in more linear. He says there's people who have the idea that the real fun of Pokemon doesn't start until after the main story has been completed. Then he talks about the hexagonal shape of the region, and the piers and sky scrapers in Hiun City.

The name Isshu comes from "isshurui" which means "one type/kind/species" according to Masuda. He says unconnected races, Pokemon and people come together to form "many types/kinds/species" in the region.

Sugimori acknowledges this is the first time since red and green that they've only used new Pokemon in game. He says he had to make sure that all of the new Pokemon had their own ecological system/sense to them. Iwata mentions that it's not just thinking up new Pokemon, but also thinking of the balance. Sugimori says that they go to Aquariums and Zoos to make sure the Pokemon have a strong base in reality, but also consider how much they can surprise us and look for the proverbial "line" for what's an acceptable design.

Less than 10 people were involved in total for R/B's designs. Sugimori still draws all the final, official images himself. He also does the drawings from various angles that are given to the sprite artists [the ones for the starters can be seen in popup, these ones also appear in Peer]. They talk about this process "filtering" all the people's designs and ideas and finally making them "pokemon-like" and maintaining the "Pokemon look". They want to avoid designs that are impossible, or ones that are difficult to explain. 17 people designed Pokemon this Generation. All the Graphic Designers were involved as well. It's like that every time. Even if it's only one idea, every one on the team comes up with or draws at least one Pokemon each.

Masuda says that his input tends to be in the later half of development, when they line up all he images of the new Pokemon on the wall of the conference room and he looks at them and goes "Hmm, this section has too much of this color." or "Was this Pokemon alright being this color, again? Could we change it?" But other than that he really leaves the designing up to Sugimori and doesn't butt in much.

Part 3: Connecting Online
Masuda talks about how he'd hoped the DS game card could talk directly to the PC, but of course that's impossible, so they stuck with Wi-Fi. Setting up the dream world took a long time. They original planned to have Mii-like avatars, but then realized that was silly because you looked different from your in-game self, which looked different from you - sort of like having 3 protagonists, which they said was weird and disconcerting. So they decided to have only Pokemon appearing in the Dream World. It was around that time they noticed that Sugimori's team had already designed Munna, who has a connection to dreams, and decided to use it as the mascot. They wanted to make a global community where people communicated, not just a place to get berries and other items. In all it took 2 years to perfect.

They originally had no plans to include infra-red, especially because when they tested it it cut the battery life in half. So, you connect via Infra red but then switch over to wireless when battling, apparently. You can trade anywhere, anytime, even from boxes while playing.

The live caster was initially thought up as a way to talk to Professor Araragi during the game.

Part 4: The Unchanging Pokemon-ness
They talk about all the parts of Pokemon that are unchanging. And talk about the thoughts behind TMs being infinitely usable and why they thought players would like it, rather than having them not use them for fear of wasting them and making them like collectibles.

Part 5: New World, New Meetings
Masuda thinks that the plot and characters are different to those of previous games and think people will be surprised by it. He wants people to experience it without being spoiled, to the point that none of them will even give their opinions or reactions to the climax.

Sugimori and Iwata talk about the many people who's only new pokemon is the starter each game, relying on the old ones to fill out their team, and how it's refreshing that in this game you're forced to have to learn about and try out new ones. He wants you to feel like you did with Red and Green, discovering news ones and hopefully finding a few new favourites. Ishihara wants there to be a feeling of accomplishment once you finish the games. He says that he's played the games three times, each with a different starter, and says he thinks he's only done about 1/5 of all the stuff there is to do, not including the Dream World, which he hasn't touched yet. Iwata says that if that's the case they've really done a great job.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOes!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My head exploded now that my mission to have isshu still be japan has failed! oh, well! Now that thats over, I can get over it and enjoy the fact that I live in isshu's, yeah, I never though it was NY and I live there, Kindaweird.

Wow that's actually really nice, smooth even. I felt almost no physical pain from watching that Pokemon trade. It looks like trading will finally be enjoyable rather than a task I regret every few days when I have to make a trade. On a related note, the ingame BGM was spiffy, Gochiruzeru's cry sounded cool and Gigaiasu's Pokemon icon looks huge compared to the others :S

Wow that's actually really nice, smooth even. I felt almost no physical pain from watching that Pokemon trade. It looks like trading will finally be enjoyable rather than a task I regret every few days when I have to make a trade. On a related note, the ingame BGM was spiffy, Gochiruzeru's cry sounded cool and Gigaiasu's Pokemon icon looks huge compared to the others :S

Would that mean that Gigaiasu is much bigger than we, more I, think it is? I could be a Large pokemon, but I don't see it.

Like I care about spelling, as long as you can understand me, I don't care.

95% of teens would cry if they saw the Jonas Brothers at the top of a skyscraper about to jump. Copy and paste this if you are in the 5%﻿ that would shout 'Jump'! Copy this second bit too if you would push them off as well. (Started by pokemonmaster8.)

So then Isshu is based on New York then right? No more going back and forth? Well it looks like Junichi Masuda was very involved in the Pokemon Black and White project. I'm impressed because from what I knew, he was more responsible for the ingame BGM and not exactly all the video game planning and marketing stuff. If it means that all game's Masuda is involved in get a perfect score upon review, then he can design the concepts for Pokemon video games any day and I can't complain.

The first thing I noticed was that Pikachu's got new Sugimori art. At least this time it isn't radically different from his old style, where the old art looked out-of-place. It makes me curious if other Pokemon will be receiving new artwork.

But yeah, this compounds what most of us were thinking from the sketchy Pokemon Pia beta cover! Isshu is New York. That's awesome.

The first thing I noticed was that Pikachu's got new Sugimori art. At least this time it isn't radically different from his old style, where the old art looked out-of-place. It makes me curious if other Pokemon will be receiving new artwork.

Isn't that just special promotional artwork or something, and not official Generation 5 artwork that'll be used for Pikachu from now on? I hope the other Pokemon don't all get new artwork. There's no real point to it since most of the older artwork is still relevant.

Originally Posted by T9009

I can see Huin City being based on NY, but I live in upstate NY, and there are definitely no deserts, haha...

I suppose it's not entirely based on New York, just part of it. Most likely, just the important parts and deserts and caves make up the rest of the region. Filler locations basically since, geographically speaking, New York isn't very diverse from what I've seen. It would've made much more sense to have it based on California. California is actually quite diverse; what with the sea, cities, deserts, forests, mountains, caves, etc. Model-thin, tanned female characters would be interesting to see ingame, too lol. Well either way, Black and White seem to be piling on the awesomeness

I live in NY and have to say, I don't see why magical creatures would be running around our city... i mean other places are far better, California sounds good, diversity of landscape and all + size, I still wish it was in Japan, I mean New York and America have been around for about a little over 200years, but Japan is the oldest country on Earth, so how many pokemon can be based on mythology, or culture in NY? Though, some Native American Mythology based pokemon would be cool, there have been tons of tribes in our area, even my town (which is close to the city) is named after one.

Because I'm sure Japan has sandy deserts next to volcanoes and west of eternally-raining forests that contain entire towns of treehouses, all north of a community built entirely on living organisms.

It's not as if regions haven't made additions to the basis for said region, such as Hoenn.

It's freaking NYC. It's not that far-fetched and out there to be incomprehensible.

Actually I think it would have been cool if it was a bit more far-fetched, can you imagin a region based on Micronesia, of Anndora, or even Azebajan? It would be cool to see how many people don't know where those places are!

But at least it looks like you can trade more than 6 Pokemon, as you can trade Pokemon from your PC.

Where exactly did they get this video from though?

From Nintendo's japanese site. There's also some new videos besides that (http://www.nintendo.co.jp/ds/irbj/mo...cm2/index.html), but they aren't very interesting as they contain little gameplay. We find out that Meguroko learns Torment and Shimama learns Stomp, I guess.

But at least it looks like you can trade more than 6 Pokemon, as you can trade Pokemon from your PC.

Where exactly did they get this video from though?

From the new Iwata Asks.

If you watch the video, you see you can only select one Pokemon. Of course, you can select from ANY Pokemon in your box without visiting it, plus the actual trading is faster. But still... a 1:1 ratio for trading over 600 Pokemon will take forever.

Hmm guys, are we SURE it wasn't merely the writer's "opinion"? There are a few words in that sentence I can't be bothered to try to read lol, so I have to trust you about them not being something like "...that's what we think lol".

Originally Posted by Snowyarticuno

Clearly Bianca is the Shadow Triad

FACT: You never see her at the end
FACT: Musharna can create illusions in a similar manner to the Triad's vanishing acts
FACT: Musharna can create illusions of people
FACT: You never see the Triad until after Bianca gets her Muuna
FACT: Being the Shadow Triad would give her something to do in life

FACT: You never see her at the end
FACT: Musharna can create illusions in a similar manner to the Triad's vanishing acts
FACT: Musharna can create illusions of people
FACT: You never see the Triad until after Bianca gets her Muuna
FACT: Being the Shadow Triad would give her something to do in life

So glad that the mystery is finally history. Now I'm even more pumped to play Pokemon Black and White. I can't wait to run through the concrete jungle that is Hiun City! Anyway, I'm still very much interested in knowing why Gigaiasu's Pokemon icon is so large in comparison to the others. Minezumi was there and some other Pokemon but their icons looked positively miniscule compared to Gigaiasu's. It can't be too large in the games, can it? :S